A Song of Ice and Fire
by I'm a Veronica
Summary: Charlene is a Lone Wolf. Clarisse is a Pack Animal. What happens when the Wolf and the Dragon meet? In a storm Clarisse dies, and wakes up in New York. Charlene is called back to re-join the Avengers and team up with this time-travelling Viking to stop an evil and save the world! Will they succeed or will they fall? Co-written with Dragons and Breakfast Food. R&R!
1. Chapter 1

**A SONG OF ICE AND FIRE**

 **Prologue: Winter is Coming**

"Get into the HYDRA base, they said. It'll be easy, they said…" a girl with dark hair growled as she trudged through the snow. "Easy mission, my ass." She snapped at nothing as she stopped walking to kick the snow at her feet with a frustrated huff.

Charlene Barnes was a respected agent of SHEILD, respected as in do not ever send her on a kiddy-mission. A mission oh-so like the one she was currently on. She was going to have words with Fury when she got home, many, many words…

Speaking of which…

" _Barnes! Come in! Charlie I know you can hear me, pick up!"_ her rather annoying uncle barked through her communication watch. Charlene had half a mind to just cut the thing off and let Hawkeye talk to nothing for hours, but then she'd get a lecture from him later how it's 'impolite' to hang up on your uncles.

She pressed the answer button on her watch and snapped, "What?"

 _"No need for attitude little lady! Just checkin' up on my favorite niece is all, how's your first solo goin' Charlie?"_ Charlene glared at the screen of her watch, where Hawkeye's smug smirking face was displayed on the small screen. He knew full well she hated the nickname Charlie, which only made it more amusing to him.

"It's going fine Uncle Clint, but it would be going better if you didn't blow my cover five-minutes in." she replied, her voice dripping with sarcasm.

 _"Well I'll leave you to it Charlie, I'll tell your mom you said hi. Good luck kiddo!"_ And with that Hawkeye disconnected and Charlene rolled her eyes at him. The fact he felt the need to check on her was a gut-punch in itself.

"Kiddo? I'm sixteen." She grumbled to herself. Everyone at SHEILD and the Avengers saw her as their little baby. But she wasn't a kid anymore, she wanted to be treated like just another agent. Better yet, the Best agent. Just like her mom was, or would use to be once Charlene filled that role.

As the daughter of Agent Natasha Romanoff, and former fugitive Bucky Barnes, she had somewhat of a big shadow to get out of. And she planned on doing that by being virtually perfect at everything she did, it was a pain in the ass but at least in the long run she'd be thought of as an equal to her mother and her team.

And to make matters worse she got partnered with her idiot of a brother who just happened to hate her guts with a burning passion. Did she hate him back? Of course not! Did she wish he didn't hate her? Also yes! But people in Hell want Ice-Water so she learned to deal with it.

Charlene stopped her inner rant once she spotted her target; a large white cluster of buildings made to look like an army base sat behind the bunch of bushes she currently hid behind. Taking a pair of tundra-camouflaged binoculars from her white parka, Charlene scanned the perimeter looking for her target. She suddenly spotted him; a big burly sack of a man with a scar across his face and a gratuitous amount of facial tattoos. She even spotted one that looked like a snake.

He was identified as White Fang; that was original. It was probably a suicide mission to bring this guy in alone, but she was willing to do whatever it took. As much as she strove for perfection, it was never good enough for the Avengers or her parents, so she took her first solo mission as soon as the opportunity came. She was ready, no matter what the Avengers thought.

Alright, time to catch a criminal.

Charlene's hand drifted to the pistol at her belt, screwing on the suppressor and carefully aiming it up towards Fang… only to find him no longer there. "Damn… where are you?" she mumbled to herself. Charlene undid her tightly woven braid, letting her dark hair fall down her back before braiding it again and moving from her hiding spot to pursue her target.

Getting past guards was easy, since the base was long abandoned until Fang found his way here to hide like a coward with at least a dozen body-guards. Speaking of which…

Three bullets shot from her gun, downing an equal amount of HYDRA soldiers. Charlene smirked as she blew the smoke away from the barrel before running ahead, shooting down two more bodyguards in her wake.

By the time she'd located a map of the building, she felt like shooting that too. The thing was near impossible to understand, not to mention it was all in Norwegian or something, the only language she didn't know.

This was stupid, how was she supposed to find White Fang without knowing where he was? Or even where **_she_** was!

A small shadow figure darted to the side just out of the corner of her eye, catching Charlene's attention. Her head immediately shot up at the possible attacker, grabbing her pistol and aiming it at where she saw the shadow pass. When she saw nothing she still did not lower her weapon, instead Charlene took a tentative few steps forward, having a growing suspicion that White Fang could've been the figure she saw.

She'd followed her instincts until they lead her down to the subbasement floors, many of them being used for storage but rumors among other SHEILD trainees stated they were sometimes used for human mutation experiments and horrible torture.

Charlene held her pistol with an even tighter grip as she descended into the shadows of the basement, going solely on the gut-wrenching dread that began to gather in her stomach. She felt like she shouldn't have been there, like she was trespassing.

Before she could turn back and forget about her stupid suspicion, a small sound reached her ears.

It sounded like a child crying, weeping silently in the dark with no one there. Charlene tried to shrug it off as her imagination but then she heard it again. A little kid crying in the pitch blackness, clear as day.

"Hello?" she stupidly called out against her better judgment. Most of her brain was screaming at her to turn back and keep focusing on the mission, but a small part of her wanted to investigate the weeping child. Maybe they were a prisoner, or worse a test subject. Perhaps those rumors of human experimentations were true, and this child was just a helpless victim.

Morals winning over logic, Charlene reached into her parka and pulled out one of her survival flares and lit it, the dark basement suddenly flooded with bright red light.

Her dark eyes spotted the source of the tiny cries; a little girl with black hair spread out across her shoulders in all manner of directions, her hands had her legs pulled up to her chest, she had her face buried in her knees as she cried. Charlene then realized why; the little girl had blood gathered in a pool at her feet, a horrible gash on her arm most likely the source of it.

The girl didn't seem to have noticed her presence yet, she was too busy bleeding out and crying about it. Charlene set the flare down next to the girl and knelt down to her eye-level with her. She gently shook her shoulder, "Shh, it's alright." She soothed, getting the girl's attention. Her head shot up revealing her tear-stained and bruised face along with her dark eyes wide with fear.

She immediately scooted away from Charlene, a look of terror on her little face; she had to be no older than four, maybe five. Charlene took some gauze and water from her parka and reached out to the girl, only for her to flinch and hold her arms up as if afraid the SHEILD agent would strike her.

"It's okay, I'm not going to hurt you," she spoke softly, setting the medical supplies down and grabbing something else from her pack. She held it out for the girl to take; a shiny red apple she'd been saving for when the mission was over or if she simply had the munchies.

The little girl opened her eyes and stared at the fruit, looking from it then to Charlene and back again, like she was testing to see if this was real and not a trick in which her punishment would be another beating.

Charlene just smiled gently again, still holding out the apple. The little girl moved slowly at first, reaching out to take it, then within seconds she snatched it away and held it close just in case Charlene planned to steal it back. The kid took a big bite of the fruit and smiled when the flavor hit her tongue after weeks of malnourishment.

While she was focused on her apple, Charlene took up the gauze and water again, tearing a piece of the cloth and soaking it with water. She gently took the girl's injured arm and dabbed the gauze over the dried blood, making the girl wince again but not pull away. The SHEILD agent gave her another smile before continuing to clean the wound and wrap it in fresh gauze.

Once she finished the girl had reduced her apple to a fruitless core on the floor. "Can you walk?" Charlene asked. The little girl nodded and let the agent help her to her feet. She pressed the call button on Fury's contact number and waited for her watch to patch him through.

 _"Barnes! What are you doing? You're supposed to be in the middle of an important search-and-destroy mission, not calling…"_

"I know Fury, I ran into a little obstacle," she explained as she tilted the screen down so Fury could see the little girl, who was currently burying her little face into her fur parka.

 _"What's a kid doing in White Fang's hideout?"_ Fury demanded.

"My best guess is prisoner, but I can't understand why."

 _"Well get her outside and back to the ship, we'll bring White Fang in another time, protecting that kid is your objective now."_ He replied. Charlene nodded, a look of determination written across her face as she disconnected and turned to the little girl.

"I'm going to get you out of here okay? Stay close to me." She told her, the girl nodding. Charlene scooped the child up in her arms and hoisting her up onto her back like she was giving the girl a piggyback.

Remembering the turns and corridors she walked through on her way in, Charlene retraced her steps until she was at least one more turn away from being outside again. But she was stopped once she heard voice up ahead.

She stopped walking and set the girl down next to her, "Stay here, don't make a sound. Be Ninja quiet." She instructed, the little girl nodding before crouching down on the ground, her dark hair and the darkness of the halls making her almost invisible to the naked eye.

Charlene took out her pistol once again, reloading and cocking it so it was fully loaded and at the ready. She quietly moved forward to peek around the corner at the men talking. She cursed under her breath when she noticed one of them was White Fang, the person he was speaking to was not visible from her standpoint, much to her misfortune.

"Are we ready to put our little Lexi to work?" the mystery man asked.

White Fang nodded with a smirk that gave Charlene a slight shiver up her spine, "Just about. And what of our other… _special_ guest?" he asked. That dark feeling in the pit of her stomach was back, she got a bad feeling he was talking about her.

"Don't worry about her, by the time we've finished here Charlene be nothing but collateral damage." Charlene gave a slight gasp. "Trust me, she won't even remember her name when I'm done with her."

The SHEILD agent backed away from the wall back to the little girl, only to find her not there anymore. Another gasp left her lips and she frantically searched for the child but to no avail. She'd just… vanished. How does that happen?!

Charlene tried backing up only for her back to be met with a hard surface that was not the wall. She whipped around meeting the ugly sight of White Fang grinning from ear to ear like a madman.

"Hello pretty bird, looking for me?" he taunted.

Her hand flew to her pistol as she threw it up to shoot him in the head when he caught her wrist and snapped it in his grasp like a twig, making her cry out in pain as he then flung her against the wall. Charlene hit the floor, her vision blurring as she reached for her gun again, only for it to be kicked away by Fang.

She could barely make out the taser alive with electricity in his hand as he grabbed a fistful of her hair, yanking her up with a cry from her lips.

"Don't cry little bird, it'll only be agonizing pain from here on out!" he cackled as he thrust his hand forward, the taser meeting the base of her neck and jolting her with electricity until she went limp. He dropped her body on the ground again with a smirk.

Charlene was still awake but clinging to consciousness as she was losing it fast. Suddenly a hand started petting her hair, clearly not Fang as this one was gentler and softer as it undid her braid and ran their fingers through her dark hair. She tried to lift her hand, kick, cry out, anything to get these freaks away from her, but she couldn't move.

"Shh… it'll be okay little wolf." A soothing voice whispered. "By the time we're done, we'll have made you all better." She let out a defeated breath as she started fading into unconsciousness.

"Just… sleep…"

And then everything went black.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 1: Fire and Blood**

 _A black shadow, breathing flames hotter than the sun._

 _A white figure, tilting its head up and howling to its mother moon._

 _A flash of lightning._

 _The crashing of waves in her ears._

 _Cold._

 _And endless void of darkness and cold emptiness._

 _Death._

Clarisse gasped as sleep was ripped away and light flooded her eyes. Droplets of sweat clung to her forehead as her chest moved rapidly trying to catch her breath. The dream she'd been pulled from was one she'd been having for weeks now. Always the same; a black dragon, a white wolf, and a dreaded feeling of hopelessness she could only describe as death. And she'd been in death's embrace before.

It wasn't fun.

She blinked her emerald eyes to rid her mind of those images, but to no avail. The ring of those sounds still lingered in her mind. Those images ever present behind her tired eyelids, but she did her best to push it back as she climbed out of bed, her toes immediately curling from the contact of the cold wooden floorboards. She said nothing as she walked to her armoire as chose her clothes for the day.

She dressed as she always did; a black corset with multiple buckles and straps and one of the sleeves crossing her chest and providing her left shoulder with a piece of leather armor, her long black ribbon tied around her right bicep, her shredded red and black skirt that was shorter than most, thigh-high black leather boots, her bird-skull mask around her neck and hidden beneath her layers of feathery auburn hair, and her bracers.

Clarisse grabbed her cutlass Looking Glass and strapped it around her waist, then she took her flintlock, Sunshine, and slipped it into her belt, and checked her gauntlets, Ignis Regina, to make sure they were full of enough bullets. They always were.

She adjusted the black feather in her hair, and checked both her necklaces to see if they were indeed around her neck; a silver locket reaching just beneath her bodice, and a black chord with a dragon's tooth reaching her collar.

With one look in the mirror, Clarisse took a deep breath as she touched the scar over her eye. The one thing that stopped the illusion that she was perfect. She hated that word. She hated being referred to by that word. She shook her head clearing those thoughts away for the second time that morning.

Seeing that everything was in order Clarisse tossed a lock of hair over her shoulder before crossing the room so she stood beneath one of the sturdier rafters of the room.

There slept a black dragoness with scales dark as a raven's wings.

"Nevermore, time to get up." Clarisse told her Night Fury. Growling at being woken up, Nevermore opened her lilac eyes to give her rider and best friend a look that said 'Really?'

Clarisse just smirked as the dragoness leapt down from her sleeping spot, a small ledge above the floor between rafters just big enough to fit her, onto the floor with her rider. She stretched her legs and yawned like a lioness before climbing back up the rafters and out a window installed in the ceiling.

The auburn-haired girl rolled her eyes before climbing up after her. Once she was on the roof she sucked in a breath of icy Berkian air with a content smile.

Clarisse Branwen Haddock, now 21 years of age, grinned at the familiar flash of auburn hair down on the ground with a dragon almost identical to her own.

"Shall we see how the Chief is fairing?" she asked as she turned to Nevermore. The Night Fury purred in agreement before jumping off the roof onto the snow-covered ground, Clarisse following close behind.

The mop of wild hair was currently speaking to a couple villagers regarding food supplies for the coming winter, or current winter judging by all the snow. "Bucket, I told you, I can't just give out extra food to people; winter's here and we need all the food we can get." His nasally voice explained.

"Having trouble there, Chief Dragon Boy?" Clarisse smirked as she snuck up behind her brother. After their father's unfortunate death Hiccup had become Chief of Berk, he always had said he wasn't ready, but as it turned out he was a natural born leader. Hiccup jumped, letting out a yelp at the sudden presence of his twin,

"Don't startle me like that!" he said, she let out a giggle at his reaction.

"But it's really funny the way your eyes kind of bulge when you're scared." Clarisse replied, having to cover her mouth to stifle her laughter. Hiccup rolled his eyes before a smirk appeared on his face.

"Well then I guess… Toothless now!" he suddenly shouted, a black figure tackling his sister to the ground in a murderous flurry of affectionate licks.

Toothless, her brother's Night Fury, was Alpha King of the dragons, ironic considering the most dangerous dragon in the archipelago was attacking Clarisse with his licking-powers. "Aw, Toothless stop! Gross! Come on, I just did my hair!" Clarisse yelped, completely at the mercy of her brother's best friend. "Nevermore, deploy smother-defense!" she called out. The lavender-eyed dragoness heard her rider's pleas and jumped onto Hiccup's back, her weight immediately knocking the man down and holding him in place as she sat on him.

After about five minutes of smothering, licking, and screaming, Hiccup called a truce, "Okay, okay! No more licking! Nevermore, get off me!" he surrendered with a laugh, the female Night Fury purring before dragging her tongue up his face to avenge her rider's hair. Hiccup made a disgusted sound as Clarisse got to her feet laughing at his expense.

The twins then burst out in a fit of cackles, unaware of the woman watching them with a motherly smile on her face.

The sound of someone clearing their throat snapped the siblings out of their laughing, both looking up to see their mother looking at them with an arched eyebrow and a knowing smirk.

"Oh, hey mom." Hiccup said with the clear of his throat, standing up strait trying to look serious. This proved to be difficult since he had a lock of his hair sticking up vertically thanks to the dragon spit in his auburn locks. Clarisse snickered,

"You got a little…" she explained before smoothing the piece of hair down with one final giggle. Hiccup gave her a grateful nod before they turned back to their mom.

Valka smiled at her children, "Having fun?" she asked.

"Only, like, all the time," Clarisse smirked with her hands on her shapely hips. The relationship between Clarisse and her birth-mother had started out anything but healthy; she'd rejected her for never being there when she could've, and at one point convinced herself she hated Valka. But after a while she calmed down and decided to give her mother a chance, later finding out the two had a lot in common. They were closer than ever now, and Clarisse finally had a mother.

"Well I hate to end the fun between my children, but I think you both should start work," Valka replied. Hiccup nodded before turning to his twin,

"I'll see you later then?"

"Duh."

He rolled his eyes with a smile before following their mother to the great hall to start Chief-stuff, or whatever he called it, with Toothless licking Nevermore's face before trotting off to do Alpha dragon stuff. While Clarisse waved them off, going the opposite direction to the docks, Nevermore at her heels.

After he became Chief, Hiccup appointed Clarisse Berk's official Master of Ships, meaning she was in charge of all trade, travel, and defense ship-wise. She had her own ship, a crew, and ran the Berkian waters as Captain Clarisse the Cunning Trickster.

She examined her three ships she was captain of from the edge of the dock; Valkyrie's Bane, The Dragon's Daughter, and her most favorite, The Lupus Regina.

The crew of Lupus Regina greeted her formally with a quick salute and verbal "Captain" before getting back to work adjusting the sails, swabbing the deck, etc.

Clarisse walked calmly up to the helm, the black dragoness having left her side to climb up the mast and leap into the crow's nest, getting comfortable before scanning the horizon for any threats. Clarisse smiled before contently running her fingers along the smooth wood with a content inhale of the salty air she'd become addicted to over her seventeen years on the Gypsy Danger.

"Captain?" asked the familiar voice of her closest friend. Eret, son of Eret, was Clarisse's best friend when she was young. His father and her adopted father were good friends and they often spent time together as children. She was thrilled to see him again when Hiccup had dragged… I mean, asked her to investigate the frozen Dragon Trapper base.

It only made sense for Clarisse to make him her First Mate.

"Yes, Eret?" Clarisse replied, slightly annoyed at being ripped from her daydream.

Eret handed her a compass before asking with a smirk on his tattooed face, "Shall we stretch her legs Clary?"

Clarisse flipped open the compass, identifying the heading of west, as seen this time of year the west winds were risky, but a skilled sailor such as herself knew exactly what moves to make. She smirked before snapping the compass shut and tossing it back to Eret.

"Bring me that horizon." She replied, her emerald gaze locked onto a set of storm clouds forming in the west. Eret nodded,

"Raise the sails! Weigh anchor! Set for the west, you dusty old birds!" Eret ordered as Clarisse's experienced hands ghosted over the wood of the helm. Her fingers closed around the teeth of the wooden wheel; she took in a large breath of salty air as the Lupus took its own first taste of work for the day.

She steered the ship to the right as wind finally caught the sails and they were off, the crew hard at work and Clarisse lost in her love for the sea. The Master of Ships felt her heart race and her spirit soar at the spray of salty water that dampened her feathery hair. The Lupus bobbed about on the waves in an almost joyful manner with Clarisse at the wheel.

 ** _Let's speed it up a little,_** she thought.

"Eret, take the wheel! I'm going for a walk." She smirked as her friend took hold of the helm and Clarisse, as quick as the dragon she rode, ran forward grabbing a length of rope tied to the deck. Pulling her cutlass she sliced the rope, the rope yanking her upwards.

She let go landing on one of the higher logs of the mast, quickly finding her balance and strolling along the narrow length of wood.

Eret rolled his eyes at his friend, leaping around the mast like the energetic little bird that she was. A cold breeze blew past his face, chilling him and raising the hairs on the back of the former trapper's neck. He turned in the direction it came from to see a mass of black storm clouds moving towards the Lupus rather quickly.

His eyes widened at how close it was to them, it has been a perfect day for sailing not five minutes ago, yet now it looked as if they'd have to outmatch a monsoon.

"Captain! We have to turn back, that storm is moving too fast!" he called to Clarisse who snapped out of her ocean-induced euphoria to see what her friend was talking about. A clap of deafening thunder confirmed his words, the volume of the storm nearly startling Clarisse off of the mast she stood on! Luckily she grabbed onto the ratlines so she wouldn't plummet to her death as the wind whipped around her hair in an auburn flurry.

"Steer us back Eret, now!" she ordered, clinging to the ratline against the raging wind and now rain. The former trapper nodded once before steering the helm a hard left back in the direction of Berk. Clarisse turned up towards the crow's nest,

"Nevermore, get down here, it's not safe up there!" the Night Fury gave a bark in reply before jumping down from the crow's nest and landing on the mast beside her rider. Clarisse smiled as she pet Nevermore on the head, her ebony scales smooth and cool compared to the fury of the storm that was continuously building. "Come on girl, let's get down,"

As soon as the words left her mouth, Clarisse was thrown back in recoil at the massive lightning strike that clapped and hit the mast right between where she and Nevermore stood. The deafening sound alone was enough to knock her back, the light blinding her and throwing her off guard.

She vaguely heard Nevermore roar in shock before trying to call out to her, but Clarisse had already misplaced her foot, and by the time she'd noticed, she was already falling.

Clarisse fell from the mast, everything seemed to slow down as rain pelted her face and wind whipped her hair. If she'd have landed on deck she could have easily pulled herself to her feet, but unfortunately, her back had been slammed onto the rail of the deck with a sickening crack.

She cried out in blinding pain as she couldn't even move to prevent herself from falling over the edge and into the water.

The raging waves swallowed her in seconds, her back presumably broken preventing her from swimming back up. She could barely make out a black figure hitting the water and swing down towards her, but by the time Nevermore's teeth grabbed onto her corset, another massive wave crashed down on them both and slammed them into the seafloor, the Nightfury's teeth cutting Clarisse's stomach and her own face as both dragon and human blood colored the water around them.

Brief flashes of lightning shone above her as Clarisse lost the strength to keep fighting as she let the blackness take her.

A blinding flash of green and yellow light opened beneath her…

And her heart stopped.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 2: In the Shadows

The trust of the innocent is the liar's most useful tool

-Stephen King.

Darkness covered her like a blanket. The air was so thick it threatened to suffocate her. It smelled of sulfur and a heavy force was pushing down on her. It made a low and menacing hissing sound as it did so, its colossal jaws threatening to crush her within moments.

"Frost the Wolf of Evermore…"

Venom dripped from its fangs, each drop burned like flames and blinded her sight all the more than it already was.

She couldn't see. All she could see was blackness for miles.

"Black the beast of Shadow's Forlorn…"

The hissing grew louder, the venom burned her skin causing her to cry out in agony.

Her skin was turning hard and cold, like scales on a lizard.

Slowly, she felt the venom killing her.

A voice cried out in pain and longing. It didn't take her long to realize it was her own voice that had wailed. But why? Why was she crying and who was she crying for?

"Gold the Light of Iron's War…"

She couldn't see, she couldn't hear, she couldn't think.

All was dark,

There was nothing.

"Rose the Raven Nevermore…"

Three years.

The Wolf has been caged for three years. Snarling and biting for release, but in return is often beaten and cut like the animal it is seen as.

In the darkness, Lexi waits.

Waits for death, waits for blood. Waits for something other than the blackness that has become her light. Her room is dark, her hair is dark, her eyes once a luscious and rich brown now coal black like everything else in her life.

She sits silently on her bunk as silence stretches on from minutes into hours, yet she does nothing. Lexi just sits there, her knees pulled to her chest and her hand resting on a grotesque scar that is carved into her arm. She still remembers how she got it. Though it was three years ago, she sees it constantly as if it was a mere minute ago.

She nothing more than a wisp luring the unlucky dog into the shadows to be taken. She was supposed to cut herself to draw attention, but ended up actually harming herself on accident. The shock and the pain had driven the four-year-old to tears at the time, but in the end the Wolf was captured and it didn't matter.

At least not to them.

The wolf had had the opportunity to smell her lies, see her for the trickster she was and end her right there. But she didn't. The wolf bandaged her arm and gave her food. But was then taken anyway and turned into the pale girl she was now.

Three years.

It took three horrific years to finally break her. And Lexi had enough.

The wolf helped her, and the wolf was punished. The wolf needed help now. And so the wolf would be saved.

They would be here soon.

"Lexi." A gruff voice called as small wisps of light flooded her room and called her dark eyes to him. "They're here." Fang said, hatred in his voice and her assault rifle slung over his shoulder.

She should have said nothing, refused to fight and let them take her and the wolf away. That is what she wanted. That's what she asked for. But she knew he would cut her down before they even knew she was there if she gave up now.

In the darkness, Lexi nods.

In the darkness, Lexi moves.

White Fang runs ahead of her as she all but sprints in order to keep up with him. He suddenly stops as she follows his movements. Fang presses a code into the keypad, and the wall opens to reveal more darkness.

Lexi's heavily dilated eyes take in the picture before her; other than the pitch black she was used to, the ceiling above her was much taller, and a dark blue color, with little dots all around… more than she could count. As well as the large glowing orb that she had to shield her eyes from… the light was simply blinding.

"Lexi, we need to move." Fang orders as the seven-year-old notices their opponents for the first time. The soldiers were clearly mechanical, if their blank glass faces and hinged limbs were anything to go by. And the triangle within the six-teared circle indicated they were made by Stark himself. Made sense, the Wolf was important to him as well.

In the night, Lexi said nothing.

One of the robotic soldiers stepped forward, its optic lens focusing on the two of them and speaking in its monotone voice, "HYDRA Agents… identify yourselves."

Fang said nothing, he only reached behind his back, his large fingers closing around the hilt of his standard pistol, sure the gun was standard, but his skill with it was the farthest thing from.

The click of the trigger, the loud bang of gunfire, and within seconds the Stark droid was headless on the ground, the connection lost. The other droids saw this through their optics as hostile and moved to attack. But the partners were ready for them.

Lexi pulled a sharp dagger from her belt and chucked it at a random droid, the knife piercing its screen and 'killing' it instantly. Knife after knife she threw it perfectly, hitting and striking down every droid in her path, Fang by her side shooting and reloading with lightning speed too fast for the droids to track much less try and counter.

I know what you're thinking, "That little girl is seven, and how did she turn that robot into a pile of scrap in two seconds?" Lexi was trained to be perfect in combat since before she could learn to talk. As for Fang, he'd just always been there; he wasn't her mentor and he was the farthest thing from a family figure, but despite her always being afraid or even terrified of him, he was all she knew…

Him and the darkness.

With another bullet fired, and another blade thrown, the last of the droids fell. "That takes care of that," Fang sneered at the destroyed robots, kicking one's severed head as if it were garbage. Lexi said nothing as she began to follow him back into the base, back into the dark, when the air shifted.

With speed to rival Quicksilver, Lexi grabbed Fang's arms and pulled him to the ground as an arrow pierced the ground where he once stood. Fang shoved the girl away roughly, so she was on the ground now, and pulled his pistol again.

A SHIELD hovercraft was at least twenty feet in the air, with a rather buff man aiming a notched bow at Fang and Lexi, along with a red haired lady, and another beefy guy; but his hair was longer.

The beefy one spoke, no doubt his voice projected by a mic or something. "White Fang, hand over your prisoner, now!" he growled lowly, making Lexi's skin crawl.

Fang just laughed, "Let's do this," he said to his child partner as he reloaded his gun.

Lexi nervously looked at him, though it was doubtful he even noticed; they were just a kid with knives and a guy with one gun, the Avengers had broken out the heavy artillery for this fight. The Wolf must have been really important for them to bring the Hawk.

The frightening man glared at her, "Go secure the prisoner, they're mine." Lexi just nodded at his orders and sheathed the knife she was holding. She hesitated as the Beefy one pulled some sort of lever, opening the bottom of the hovercraft allowing the redhead to jump down and run into the facility. Lexi takes off after the redhead running into walls along the way. As blood runs into the young child's almost pitch black eyes, she squeaks in pain causing the redhead to turn around.

"What the hell?" the redhead says looking down in shock to see Lexi. In the light of the bright facility, Lexi is clearly seen to be malnourished and barely able to stand as she quickly loses blood from the cut on her head. Pieces of a skull swirls around her arms as another piece of the skull birthmark on her hand broke off darkening her eyes even more.

Silence stretched on for seven long harrowing seconds, until the child ripped a loose pipe from the wall and hit the red head in the shins before sprinting off down the halls. Black Widow cursed loudly holding her leg as she took her gun from her belt and aimed it at the little girl. She would have pulled the trigger had the child not vanished into the shadows.

Widow got to her feet despite the pain and ran after the girl. "Where are you?! Where's my daughter?!" she shouted into the darkness.

In the darkness, Lexi was listening.

Surrounded by the shadows was she, so much that the Widow didn't notice the child right beside her as she aimed her gun at nothing. Lexi reached out her small hand and interlocked fingers with the Widow, the red head jumping at the gentle contact and pointed her gun into the child's forehead.

"The cat has caught the bird, and he'll scratch your eyes out too, the wolf is this way." She whispered as Lexi tugged on her hand, leading her into the dark. The Widow snatched her hand away like she'd been burned.

"Where's my daughter? Tell me!" she demanded as she aimed her gun again. The child didn't as much as blink. All she did was tug her hand again and point down the corner. "You'll show me." She questioned, though her tone wasn't so much a question as it was a demand. Lexi nodded once and tugged her hand one more time, this time Black Widow complied and followed the child through the twisting endless corridors.

They came to a door marked with three claws slashed across the metal, the small child having to stand on her toes to reach the keypad, because of the blood running from her face the child slipped slightly on the sterile floor. If not for the life-threatening stakes, Widow would have found it slightly adorable.

The red light on the keypad turned green when Lexi put in the code 9653. The metal door swung open into more darkness, save for one florescent light over a moldy cot in the corner. A figure was hugging her knees, her skin paler than snow and her white hair a halo around her shoulders. Widow kneeled beside the girl, lightly touching her shoulder.

"Charlie, Charlie wake up detka," she said softly. The white-haired girl lifting her head slightly, just enough for Natasha to see a pair of cold silver eyes that did not belong to her daughter. Orbs of silver that saw and felt nothing because of the numbness she'd learned to control over the last three years.

That is until she met the unemotional yet warm and loving eyes of her own mother.

"M-Mom?" she said, her voice hoarse and cracking from not speaking for years, unless screaming in agony counts.

"We need to go detka." Her mother said before her daughter could add anything else. Natasha turned to the small child, who stood quietly, a pool of blood forming around her feet. Widow approached her and took her up in her muscular arms gently, the girl not struggling because she trusted Widow or because she'd lost too much blood to form strength to fight back.

Charlene pushed herself to her feet, she wobbled slightly but was better off than the girl in her mother's arms. They left the metal room and made their way back through the corridors until they reached the outside once more. Lexi winced from the moonlight and covered her eyes as Widow carried her.

Natasha laid her eyes on the sight of White Fang pinning Hawkeye with a gun to his throat, finger closing in around the trigger. Widow pulled her own gun and shot to weapon away from Fang. The muscly man growled in fury as he charged at Widow, but a familiar figure tackled him to the ground. The Winter Soldier punched Fang unconscious with his metal arm before slinging Hawkeye over his soldier and sprinting towards the SHIELD hover. He threw the Hawk inside before picking up his daughter and helping her up.

Natasha handed him the little girl, whose dark eyes were locked on White Fang, small pools of water leaking from her eyes and the smell of salt mixing with her blood-caked face.

Once Hawkeye's eyes were bandaged; Fang had landed a pretty bad strike across his eyes, the hover began to take off.

They were in the air about to be rid of that place, when White Fang woke up. He spotted the agents of SHIELD escaping and roared so loud Lexi could feel it vibrate in her teeth. The HYDRA agent locked eyes with Lexi and his anger fell away, there was nothing in his eyes but the burning pain of betrayal.

Lexi let her tears fall as another agent bandaged her head.

"Goodbye." She whispered, not loud enough for the agent to hear, but somehow, Fang heard it all.

The HYDRA base disappeared in the distance,

And in the darkness, Lexi cried.


End file.
